Druid PvE guide
Working with Other Classes Things Druids want Non-Druids to know *If there is a druid in the party you already have at least one tank, one healer, one caster, or one DPSer, but not more than one of the four. Don't expect a druid to be able to hold aggro in bear form, then be able to heal without being harassed by the enemies he was holding the aggro of a minute ago. * Druid tanking in general: Bears need time to build aggro. Give the druid a moment to build some hate, especially on multiple mobs, before you unload the trinketed super crit Fat-Boy fireball nuke. Learn to recognize the graphics for maul, swipe and lacerate. *'For Paladins and Priests when working with a druid tank'. Druids get rage from being hit. Don't shield a bear before he goes in to attack, or he won't have any rage to maul or swipe to get aggro. Save the shield for an emergency. A HoT before he's in combat helps, though. *'For Rogues and Warriors when working with a druid tank'. Use all your bleed effects, remember that mangle increases their effect by 30% so it becomes a significant addition to overall DPS. *'For any crowd controllers when working with a Druid tank'. If the Druid is planning on tanking more than one mob at a time it is often helpful if you pull your targets away before crowd controlling them as Druids will often rely on swipe in order to keep aggro on the targets. *If the druid is solo healing an instance, make sure he is resto before going on dangerous dps where you might take sudden burst damage. Only Restoration Druids have access to the instant cast direct heals which will save you. Especially mages, who should warn the druid before trying an AoE spree. *A Balance or Feral specified Druid may be able to main-heal some instances, but this is highly dependent on gear, talent selection, and experience. While the restoration tree provides for the most comprehensive healing abilities, each of the other trees is given something mana-wise "in compensation" for not going down the standard healing tree; Heart of the Wild gives feral druids in healing gear an abnormally large mana pool, and Dreamstate gives balance druids an abnormally large mana regen rate. Be aware that a large mana pool, if the druid selected either of the above talents, is not a substitue for instant heals, quick-cast heals, and heals with a low chance of interruption. Also, a Feral or Balance Druid may not have the healing experience that a Restoration Druid will have. *For the following situation: you're a class that can resurrect and in an instance, you've just died and the group is about to wipe. The druid then casts rebirth on you with the last of his mana: DO NOT RES! This should be treated the same way as a warlock's soulstone: wait until everyone is dead and the mobs have left, then res yourself and everyone else. :) *If a druid is the only healer in the party, remember that our res spell has a 20 minute cooldown (30 minutes before patch 2.3). *If you are a rogue or a warrior (or even a feral druid in bear form or cat form), we could really use the mana potions/drinks. Mid-level druids have Innervate but the cooldown is 6 minutes, so using it isn't always an option (and a lot of us prefer to use it in emergencies anyway). *Druids in caster form have no real ability to shed aggro gained by healing or casting (unlike a priest's Fade, although druids do have cower in cat form). This means that the starting phases of combat tend to be touchier with a druid healer than with a priest healer until the tank has had time build up a clear aggro advantage. *Though a druid in bear or cat form can come out to heal in an emergency, don't expect us to heal for an extended period of time. More likely than not, a feral druid's gear will not have many intellect or spirit bonuses on it. If we heal for too long, we will run out of mana and be unable to shift back into our previous form, which you do not want. *If you are working with a druid specced into Improved Faerie Fire the mobs you will be facing will likely be continuously debuffed with an extra +1/2/3% chance to be hit with melee and ranged. If you are compromising other stats to stack +hit gear, consider stacking less in this situation. *Similarly, if you are working with a druid specced into Insect Swarm, the mobs you face will in general take an additional 2% miss rate due to this debuff. If you are stacking +dodge, consider stacking less (although this is a less common strategy for melee classes). *A holy paladin and a restoration druid make for an excellent healing team, so don't continue looking for a healer for your party if you've got a paladin and a druid. *If we're sharing healing duties with you, negotiate - tell us who you want to heal, we'll tell you who we want to heal, so overhealing doesn't happen. *While forming a group, do not assume the Druid is the healer. Ask about talent build while forming the group. Feral and Balance Druids should not be assumed to be healers. *Do not overlook Balance Druids. Just as not every mage is frost or fire, not every druid is feral or restoration. Balance Druids bring their group a tremendous amount of DPS along with the Druid's usual best buff in the game (Mark of the Wild / Gift of the Wild). For deep-Balance Druids, Moonkin form adds 5% crit chance to spell casting, so the entire party's casting DPS and healing critical chance increases by 5%. For instance, in Molten Core a good strategy is to put a Moonkin in a group with four Mages. Another is to put the Moonkin with the priests. *A druid who is currently tanking/melee/casting/healing may want a chance at the leather armor that drops, even if it's not tanking/melee/casting/healing armor. They're not being greedy when they roll on cloth or leather armor. Druids have up to four jobs they are capable of doing and need the gear for them, if they are to have any chance at doing them well at all. Bear druids have a very limited range of things that do them a lot of good, so there won't be much competition. Cat druids need the same armor that rogues do, for exactly the same reasons. Moonkin druids have very little itemization in leather, so will often need the same cloth pieces that cloth casters do, again for the same reasons; and the same goes for healing pieces. If it's a little upgrade for you, but a huge one for the druid, even if he's not using that set of abilities right at the moment, consider letting him have it. Things Non-Druids want Druids to know *While buffs are generally appreciated, a smart cloth-wearer will right-click Thorns to remove it from himself. Why? Because if the cloth-wearer is attacked, Thorns will do extra damage to attackers, increasing the difficulty for the tank to re-acquire aggro. Casters have a difficult enough time as it is keeping their threat at a minimum, so the last thing they want to do is increase that threat in the unfortunate event that they're the target of an attack. This is also true to a lesser extent for Rogues and other damage-dealers who aren't tanking and don't want to maintain aggro if they happen to get it. Save your Thorns buff for those who can handle the extra threat (i.e. Warriors and pets). Only cast it on yourself if you're tanking or off-tanking. *If you are in a party, understand your role in the party. Nothing endangers a party more than a druid not being ready to switch roles. Don't stay in caster form when the party needs more DPS or Tanking. *If you have a choice between a paladin and a priest to rebirth, it is better to go with the paladin since he or she has a better chance to survive a patrolling mob while trying to rez. *Remember that Shamans have Reincarnation starting at level 30, but like Rebirth it is on a long timer. Make sure to communicate and know whether your party Shaman's Reincarnation is available in case of an impending wipe. *Make sure you restock reagents after every instance: no one wants to hear that you are out of maple seeds halfway through an instance. *Only feral druids with a decent gear and decent skills are able to tank Heroic Dungeons. Things Druids want New Druids to know *If a party asks you to heal, do not go into bear or cat form. It is near impossible to heal when you already have aggro on you. Even if you think your heals are not needed, stay in caster form. A seemingly good situation can turn ugly in a matter of seconds, and you may need to start healing at a moment's notice. *If a leather item drops with +stamina and +agility, and you're a feral druid that prefers to play in cat form, you have the same priority on it as a rogue. From time to time you're going to hear rogues crying about it, and telling you that you shouldn't roll because you're a druid - don't listen to them, if you find that playing in cat is what you prefer, then you should by all means roll on these items. Just remember that, unlike rogues, druids in cat form get two points of attack power from strength and only one point of attack power from agility. Note: Also, please attempt to figure out who needs it the most. Generally, yes Rogues will complain about Druids rolling. But most (smart, and intelligent) Rogues will let the druid have the gear if the Druid needs it more/could use it more efficiently. So before rolling on that Assassin's gear, make sure that neither class has the distinct disadvantage of having greens/lower level gear. *If you are wearing +intellect and +spirit gear, don't try to fight in cat or bear form. If you are wearing +strength, +agility, and +stamina gear, don't try to fight in caster form. If you want to really be prepared, keep two or more sets of armor: one for feral fighting and one for healing, or more specifically, one for tanking, one for feral fighting, one for healing, and one for caster fighting. *Don't underestimate Teleport: Moonglade. There is a trainer in Moonglade, as well as a free flight path to your capital city. Things Bears want Cats to know *Use your mangle when the debuff wears off. It helps the bear's lacerate and only costs you quickly regenerating energy instead of his limited rage that is better spent keeping maul and lacerate going to keep aggro off of you. The bear can mangle too, but maul has a higher aggro modifier. General tips Check the "Working With" pages for the different classes and look at the "What Xs want non-Xs to know". Always cast Mark of the Wild/Gift of the Wild on your party members, it saves lives! Only cast Thorns on people who can handle the additional aggro it gives them. Remind people that if they don't want thorns, they can remove the buff by right-clicking it. Mage Casting Mark of the Wild on them will help in certain situations, and you'll get an Arcane Intellect out of it. Ask for water if you need it, but don't yell out or demand it. They probably have to make water for plenty of other people as well. Casting Thorns on them could be a good thing if they're AoE farming, but don't bother doing it if they're not, it's no use. Good communication when it comes to rooting can also help a lot. Casting Entangling Roots on a mob that's about to be Frost Novaed is useless. Rogue In most cases do not give them thorns unless they ask for it--although they are good enough at losing aggro, over-aggroing is still a problem for some. Heal them if needed; however, remember that they're not tanks so don't focus your heals on them. Normally a rejuvenation with an occasional low-rank Healing Touch should keep them topped just fine. Remember that they don't have huge health pools. Hunter Entangling Roots is your friend. Normally, both you and the Hunter prefer ranged combat, and in this regard roots is great to keep enemies at bay. Don't forget about the hunter's pet! Hunters will thank you for buffing their pet with Mark of the Wild and Thorns, and occasionally healing it. Depending on the species, a pet can be a decent enough tank. Also, you can switch to bear form and tank yourself. Paladin Of course, buff one another. Discuss specs beforehand to decide who will fill what role. The feral Druid will likely hold aggro better than a holy or retribution Paladin. As for healing, the Paladin, while an effective enough healer, has no more than one instant cast heal (Holy Shock, and it has a cooldown), no HoTs and no AoE heals. Paladins are, however, very mana-efficient healers, which is good for long fights. Warrior If you are Feral then you may offer to let them enjoy doing DPS, as from 40-60 there is a good chance you will have much better tanking equipment than they do. If you are Cat Feral, be very careful not to Ravage or shred too early and remember to use cower. Warriors don't have as much threat building ability as your bear does so you have to be careful not to pull aggro. If there is no other healer in the party then healing will probably be a better option than your forms, as warrior bandage healing is gimp compared to even feral healing. If you are Resto then, just keep him healed, and you should be fine. Don't forget to Faerie fire his target. Possibly add to the fight with DPS, either in cat-form or with Balance spells. Don't forget if all else goes wrong you've got a combat-rez. Warlock His Soulstone is more useful on you so ask him whether he can use it on you (unless a priest, paladin or shaman is available). Normally they use either DoTs or critting shadow bolts, if they use the latter they might suddenly grab away the aggro of their pet/you so prepare for that with healing or a readily available Taunt. If they use a pet to tank, heal it; if you're not good at tanking yourself, ask them whether they're willing to use a Voidwalker. If possible also use your own DoTs for more DPS. Warlocks use Life Tap to get mana back, so if they run low on mana they will greatly appreciate a Heal Over Time spell if your own mana can be spared for that. Priest The simplest strategy is to just let the Priest heal you while you're tanking in Bear, or DPSing in Cat as the situation demands. Another way is of course to root your foe and then try and blast them away. Buff each other, use Renew and Rejuvenation when pulling. Don't use PW:shield as it will deny you early access to Rage. A druid / priest duo is one of the most effective in the game. Find a Priest. Make him or her your best friend. Always keep your priest alive be it by healing them or bear tank taunting away baddies that like them too much. If you're not tanking, and have a holy specced priest, let them do the healing. Save your mana for DPS or emergency heals if the Priest runs out. Priests heal for more and have shorter casting times. Allowing the main healer to do the majority of the healing will prevent over healing which is a HUGE waste of mana. A priest may cast a shield to reduce damage taken when they pull aggro. It is preferable to have the mob pulled off them rather than waste mana healing them. Druid Divide your tasks - DPS, tanking, and healing. Keep your buffs up at all times. If your specs differ, it should be fairly easy to decide who will be doing what. Also remember all your roles, if you are pulling too much aggro, one shift into bear and the other heal etc. Back each other up and communicate and you will find that, if you work together and don't both try to do the same thing, it is easily the best partnership possible. 40 druids (or less) can easily kill Onyxia without the aid of another class. Shaman Shaman talent trees and specializations are similar to your own; the main difference is in the melee trees. Enhancement shaman are closer to your cat form's DPS; they lack the mitigation that comes from plate/dire bear form. Realize your roles and fill them accordingly. Shaman have buffs that can either be spectacular or lackluster, depending on what each of you are trying to do. Their Grace of Air, Strength of Earth, and Healing Stream Totems can bring incredible Agility, Strength, and HP regen (repectively) to Cat/Bear form druids. Alternatively, their Totem of Wrath (41 point elemental talent), Wrath of Air, and Mana Spring Totems can provide your Moonkin with extra crit, spell damage, and mana regen (repectively). Keep in mind that you're not the only person in the group, however, and your Shaman (usually) knows what totems he needs to drop. Category:Druids